


Monsters

by Ranni



Category: Avengers, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: BAMF Clint Barton, BAMF Tony Stark, Captivity, Clint Barton & Hulk Friendship, Gen, Hurt Clint Barton, Hurt Tony Stark, Hurt/Comfort, Medical Experimentation, Monsters, Protective Bruce Banner, Protective Hulk, Protective Tony Stark, dark medicine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-25
Updated: 2017-04-25
Packaged: 2018-10-23 00:26:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10708317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ranni/pseuds/Ranni
Summary: "Okay, I've read a lot of Stephen King books," Tony says, "so I'm kind of an expert on monster plotlines. Best case scenario, we're all going to die horribly."Bruce raises an eyebrow. "That's the best case scenario??""Yeah. The worst case scenario is that we all suffer terribly first."*Or*Bruce, Tony, and Clint are trapped in a facility with a rather unfriendly creature.





	Monsters

 

"More spy secrets!" Tony demands. Somehow he has coaxed Clint into talking about his Shield career--nothing classified, of course--and is determined to keep the conversation going while the agent works on their escape. Bruce has already learned far more than he had ever wanted to know about killing people in random ways.

"Tell me how you break into secret vaults and safes and whatnot," Tony suggests. "That's relevant to my life."

"People are startlingly uncreative about hiding their crap," Clint answers, his voice a little faraway, preoccupied. His hands move over one of the mattresses, then push down onto it. He regards it speculatively. "If I ever become filthy rich you'd better believe I won't be keeping my money in a safe in the wall. That's the absolute first place anyone would look. You know--in a study with a dark mahogany desk, behind a large painting."

"This is good advice," Tony encourages. "The privileged of the world need to know this. Where would _you_ hide your stacks of hundred dollar bills?"

"I'd put it under a cast iron bathtub, because they weigh a ton, and no way in hell would anyone ever move it to look. It'd also be a good savings plan, because I wouldn't want to move it either."

"Okay, okay," Tony nods. "Best place to put a listening device? I'm guessing not under the aforementioned mahogany desk?"

"If the study needs to be bugged, it's best to put it under the chair, not the desk. And let me tell you," Clint adds, "having placed quite a few of those bugs myself, a lot--and I'm talking a _lot_ \--of shitty people wipe boogers under their desk chair."

"Ugh." Tony is horrified and delighted by this information.

"But the best place to plant a bug? The car. People make a lot of absentminded phone conversation while they're driving. Number one way to get freeform association via surveillance."

"And no boogers," Bruce observes thoughtfully.

"Nope. But lots of bad radio sing alongs." Clint winks at Tony, who is notorious for this.

"Alright, Barton, here comes the million dollar question. How do you get out of a locked cell when you have zero tools?" Tony raises his eyebrows hopefully as Clint finishes his examination of the bunk beds, the only furniture in the small room where they are currently held captive.

"That is yet to be determined. I _think_ there are springs in this mattress. If so, we can pull them out and I can pick the lock." Clint shrugs. "Maybe. Probably." He shrugs again.

"I'm getting the tiniest bit weary of getting captured all the goddamned time," Bruce admits.

"Yeah."

"Okay, lay your bets. Who is the golden goose today? Tony for his tech, Clint for Shield secrets, or me for my Hulkamania?"

Clint raises his hand, waves it frantically. "Ooh, ooh, I vote for Tony! I've been tortured enough, it's his turn."

"Tweetie!" Tony gasps in mock offense. "How _could_ you?"

"I just really, really want to make it out of here without a broken...anything. You know, for once. Just to try it out, see how it feels."

*******

  
For the first time in forever, something is different.

Maybe the men are more careless than before, or maybe the creature has finally grown strong enough. It doesn't matter which. It sees the opportunity and takes it.

It tears out the throat of the man in the lab coat in seconds, and it is free, rampaging through the underground facility.

There are more of them to kill before it can make it to the outside.

*******

  
There are noises, and Tony and Bruce exchange a startled look. Everything is muffled due to the cement walls, but Tony presses his ear to the heavy door anyway, straining to hear.

"Something's going down," he says, and the others come over to listen as well. There is the unmistakable sound of gunfire. Screams. "Could it be Shield coming in? A rescue team?" he asks Clint. It seems unlikely; they had only been taken a few hours ago.

The agent shakes his head. "I don't think so. It sounds like...some sort of animal."

Then the lights go out.

"Well, balls." Bruce's voice is mild. He steps away from the others, hands reaching out in the absolute darkness, until he finds the opposite wall. He leans against it and takes a few steadying breaths. An appearance by the Hulk would be a very, very bad thing when trapped in a small place like this one. 

*******

The creature kills the scientists easily. It was their mistake, to make it so strong, to make it much more intelligent than it had been before.

It was also their mistake to have been so cruel, because now it knows nothing of mercy.

They scream as they die, and the creature finds it likes the sound.

*******

"It's as dark as Nick Fury's soul in here," Tony observes. There is silence outside of the cell, and the uncertainty of what is going on, and the absence of light is wearing at his nerves a little. "I wish I hadn't taken out my arc reactor now. Man, the regrets just keep piling on."

Clint doesn't answer, busy trying to tear into the mattress. Tony's entire body jerks when he feels something touch him, then relaxes when he realizes it is just Bruce reaching out to grasp his hand. Tony squeezes his friend's fingers back gratefully.

"Okay, hear me out on this," he begins.

"I already hate this idea," Bruce says quickly, and Tony laughs.

"I'm just spitballing here. Could Hulk smash through the wall, then just keep smashing repetitively, effectively tunneling us out and then up while Clint and I followed?"

Clint pauses in his endeavor. "You mean like a Hulk version of Minecraft?"

"Well, when you put it that way it just sounds stupid."

"I think this scenario is only feasible in your imagination, Tony," Bruce says, but squeezes Tony's hand again, a smile in his voice.

Tony grins back, though no one can see.

"Clint," Bruce says, sounding serious now, "I appreciate what you are trying to do, but do we _want_ to leave this room? There was something pretty awful sounding going on out there. I don't know if I really want to be a part of it."

"Yeah, well--" Clint grunts, then they hear the sound of the mattress seam ripping open, and his "ha!" of triumph. "We're in a locked room with no food and water and no one knows where the hell we are. Now, we can try to wait out whatever that thing is, or we can find out the hard way if someone decides to gas or burn the facility to try and contain it."

"Isn't _that_ a pleasant thought," Tony observes. "You are a ray of sunshine, Barton. Always looking for that worst case scenario."

"It's what I do," Clint says wearily, and Tony can't decide if he is joking or not. "Now keep away from the door. I got one of the springs, and I'm picking that bitch."

******* 

It doesn't fear their guns; they cannot hurt it. The monsters in the lab made it too strong, and probably regretted doing so as they died.

It looks for a way out. It remembers enough of homes, of buildings, to know that it must find a door, must find stairs, because they are under the ground. It runs and searches, but not wildly; it must continue to be careful and clever if it wants to escape.

And it does want that. Wants to feel the sunshine again after all these years. To see the sky. To smell grass and dirt and breathe fresh air.

The creature finds the stairs at last, and there is a man there at the top level, still alive, clawing and weeping at the door. He cannot open it, cannot get out. He screams when he sees the creature, huddles against the door, calling out. The creature recognizes him as one of the monsters, one of those that wore white coats and hurt it and the others the most. It tears out the man's throat with a vicious glee that does not last long.

Because the way out has been shut, secured in some way that the creature cannot break it down, and the door is a metal too strong for its claws to tear. The human could not get out either; the ones that managed to escape must have sealed it somehow, to trap the creature here. It howls in rage and despair, the pain from this obstacle so acute it is almost physical. It had been so close. So close to being free.

When the creature falls silent at last it hears something moving in the hallways below.

Footsteps. The hushed voices of men. Somehow there are still more alive.

If the creature will not be allowed freedom, then neither will they.

It descends the stairs to find them.

*******

The power is out everywhere, but there are emergency lights illuminating the hallways, and all three men breathe a sigh of relief. They creep out as silently as possible, with Clint in the lead; he is the most adept of them in hand-to-hand combat.

"This place is a freaking maze," Tony observes in a loud whisper. "It's like 'Labryinth', with Bruce as the whiny chick and Clint as the dwarven helper. I'll be David Bowie."

"Shut up," Clint hisses, then stops abruptly. Tony plows into him, and then Bruce into them both. Stilling, they hear faint screams, then unearthly, bloodcurdling howls that echo in the distance. They exchange a look.

"I don't even want to know what _that_ is," Bruce says quickly. "Let's not find out."

"Okay, I've read a lot of Stephen King books," Tony says, "so I'm kind of an expert on monster plotlines. Best case scenario, we're all going to die horribly."

Bruce raises an eyebrow. "That's the _best_ case scenario??"

"Yeah. The worst case scenario is that we all suffer terribly first."

"Fuck that," says Clint, and in an instant he has shifted to mission mode, ready to plan, ready to fight. "We need weapons. Right now." He gestures to the doors around them. "Find something, _anything_. Preferably a gun, but barring that, something sharp or heavy. Get moving, and meet back here."

"What are you so worried about?" Tony asks. "We've got Big Green right here to protect us. Nothing is coming through this guy."

"We're underground," Bruce frets, "in an enclosed space. Please, don't make me transform here. I could kill you both without meaning to. It's too dangerous." He looks so distraught at the prospect that Tony puts a comforting hand on his arm. He starts to say something, but Clint cuts him off.

"You won't have to, Bruce. _I'll_ kill it." His voice is gravely certain. Almost on cue, the howling stops, and they look up in surprise.

"Find weapons, _now_ ," Clint says, his body tensed, listening. "And be quiet. It's tracking us."

*******

It can hear them. It can smell them.

Two are regular men; the third is manlike but there is something different about him. Something that screams danger, makes the creature both want to cower and to fight. It looks like a normal man, but it is not. 

One of the normal men is a hunter. The creature can recognize a fellow predator easily, and the brown haired man exudes malevolence in the way he creeps silently through the halls, his sharp eyes angry and watchful. The creature knows instinctively that when the fight begins, this will be the one who attacks, who fights. This man is like the monsters of the lab, in that he _wants_ to hurt, and will kill if he can.

The black haired man is not a hunter. He is wary and tense, like the others, but there is nothing aggressive about his stance. Long ago the creature would have responded to such a person, would have leaned into his touch and appealed to him with pleading eyes, would have hoped for help, for release. It has long since learned that there are no humans who help, not anymore. Not since they changed the creature from what it was into what it is now.

This will be the man it goes for.

*******

The first room Tony explores is an office, filled with computers and papers. He grabs a heavy glass paperweight, figuring it is better than nothing, then heads for another room. He almost collides with Clint, who is exiting the same room, and gives him a dark look. Clint just rolls his eyes, then glances down at Tony's paperweight.

"They were out of sharpened number two pencils," Tony offers, and Clint shakes his head with a fond, soundless laugh.

The next room is a large laboratory, and Tony's initial thrill of excitement--labs are full of dangerous implements that make good weapons--evaporates immediately when he sees the bodies. They are barely recognizable as human anymore, bitten and torn and laying in a large red pile of limbs and entrails.

"Jesus," Tony chokes out, turning away. He doesn't need to see that. Clint, however, seems less bothered. In fact, he goes over to the corpses, starts searching through them. "What are you _doing_?" Tony demands, indignant and horrified at the same time.

"I heard--" Clint pushes further in, his arms red up to his elbows, and Tony almost vomits. "I heard gunfire before." Clint stops digging suddenly, a triumphant look on his face. He pulls an assault rifle of out a severed hand. "Well, hello there, beautiful. Now, tell Papa that you have some bullets left, and we'll be best friends."

"You're disgusting," Tony tells him, repulsed, ignoring the sour look he gets in response. "I'm gonna go get a more dignified weapon. Or maybe I'll build one. Shit, lasers aren't that hard to make." It's mostly the desire to get away from the gore, the blood, and the thought of Clint rifling pragmatically through murdered human remains that makes Tony head for the other end of the large laboratory. He has just spied an operating suite, complete with some wicked looking scalpels laid out on a table, when it attacks.

( _It's small_ ) is the only thought his brain manages to stutter out before the creature is upon him, biting his leg viciously with what feel like iron jaws. Everything is a flurry of movement and pain, and Tony can't make out what it is, exactly, only that it means to kill him. He brings his fists down on what feels like leather plates, and the creature looses him for a fraction of a second, only to bite down again, this time on his knee.

"CLINT!" Tony shouts, but he already hears the gunshot, can feel the bullet zip right past his cheek. The creature appears unaffected, bites down again, ripping flesh. Hawkeye fires again, then again rapidly, then gives up and attacks the creature with the butt of the gun while Tony tears at its eyes with clawed fingers.

"Get the fuck off of him!" Clint snarls, looking almost feral himself, then lowers the gun and reaches toward the table of cutting implements that Tony had been drawn to earlier. The creature turns its head slightly--Tony's leg still firmly between its jaws--to track the movement, and its body tenses as it seems to recognize the tools. It releases Tony and takes off through an open door. Clint raises his gun immediately and takes one last shot as it disappears.

*******

Bruce has also found a laboratory.

Animals of all kinds were kept here, and all are dead. Different kinds of primates, large dogs, even a few cats. Bruce guesses that some sort of gas was released when the creature had broken containment--an attempt to kill it and to prevent any additional escape attempts. The creature had fled this room and lived, but all the other test subjects had died, still in their cages.

None of the animals look right, they all have been...altered...somehow. Bruce's eyes pass quickly over a chimp with fanged teeth and some quill-like spines protruding from its back. It doesn't look fierce though, only pitiable--a creature that had been mutilated and tortured before it had finally been killed. He can't bring himself to look at the others.

No harm had come to Bruce and his friends in that cell. Not _yet_ anyway; the creature had begun its reign of terror and inadvertently spared them from sharing whatever horrors it had suffered. But Bruce has no doubt now that it was the Hulk that these scientists had been after. Bruce would have been a full time blood and DNA donor, with Tony and Clint's lives the leverage used to make him cooperate. Or his friends might have been test subjects, in cages not unlike these. The thought makes him nauseous, makes the Hulk rumble angrily inside him.

Bruce can only breathe fully again when he has left the room. He decides not to tell the others about it, thinks they would be happier not knowing.

When he hears the gunshots he runs toward them.

*******

Clint half supports, half drags Tony back into the bland, small office he had taken the paperweight from. His left leg is almost useless, bleeding heavily, the kneecap probably broken.

"I hit it," Clint says, mostly to himself. "I hit it, I _know_ I did, but the bastard kept going. I know I hit it."

Tony thinks the archer is having trouble reconciling a reality where a gun and his perfect aim aren't enough to bring something that small down. It couldn't have been more than three feet tall, but it had been deadly, and singleminded in its fury.

"You _did_ get it, but it has some sort of organic armor plating," Tony tells him, groaning as he lowers himself to the floor and begins a cautious examination of the bites on his leg. Clint's hands quickly replace his, pulling up his pant leg carefully with a sharp intake of breath.

"Oh man, that looks nasty." Clint's face settles into a look of grim determination and he grabs the gun again. "I'll find a first aid kit somewhere, see if I can't get Bruce, too. You stay here, keep your back against the door. There's only one entrance to this room; it won't be able to get in."

"Do _not_ go out there, Tweetie, that thing is batshit crazy. Probably rabid or something. You saw those bodies. I don't want you to be the next one."

"I won't be." He sounds confident enough, but his eyes don't look as sure.

*******

But he does come back, and returns with Bruce, a first aid box, and a disturbing selection of scalpels and medical saws from the lab. Bruce examines Tony's leg while Clint opens the first aid kit.

"What a piece of shit!" the archer exclaims as he digs through it. "There's like...five bandaids, a roll of gauze, and one antibacterial wet wipe. What the hell kind of aid can you give with _this_?" He tears open the wet wipe and holds up the tiny square, looking back and forth between it and Tony's gaping wounds. The expression on his face would have been comical in any other situation.

"Let's just stop the bleeding, and we can worry about infection later," Bruce advises. His eyes search the office and settle on a long sweater hanging from a hook on the door. "Give me that." He uses a pair of scissors from the desk to cut it into strips, which he ties tightly around Tony's knee and leg. "That's the best we can do for now. Can you walk?" He holds out his hand to help Tony up.

"I'll bloody well walk out of here!" Tony manages to get to his feet, Bruce and Clint moving to either side of him. He closes his eyes briefly. Bruce and Clint exchange a glance and Bruce tightens his grip around Tony's arm.

"Take it easy a minute," the scientist says. "What's our plan for the...the thing?" he asks Clint.

"I shot it four times and it didn't phase it one bit. Tony said it had some sort of armor plating."

"I _did_ say that, because it _does_ ," Tony says crossly, opening his eyes again. "I don't understand how or why, but it does."

"They were experimenting on animals," Bruce says quietly. "I saw some of it when we were looking around earlier. It's...pretty bad. This thing must've gotten loose somehow."

"So they souped it up and tricked it out with advantages, then were destroyed by it. I do believe that is a classic case of being hoisted on one's own petard." Tony feels a little steadier now, though the blood loss is making him a little more light headed than he cares for, and his maybe-broken knee hurts like a bastard. "So...we can't shoot it, and I'm guessing Bruce doesn't feel comfortable Hulk-fighting it."

"What I don't feel comfortable with is bringing an underground bunker crashing down around my friend's heads _while_ I fight it. The Hulk isn't especially known for his focus and control."

"Then we don't fight it," Tony suggests. "We trap it somehow, in a room like this. Or we just evade it and get the hell out. I haven't seen an elevator, but there have to be stairs somewhere." The others nod. "But whatever we do, we have to make it snappy, before whoever runs this place decides to come back and retake it, or to...you know...raze it and start fresh."

"Yeah, I'd like to not be here when either of those things happen."

Clint grabs the rifle. It had been ineffective, but he seems to feel more secure with it. He hands Bruce and Tony scalpels, and tucks one up under his wristwatch. "Let's get the fuck out of here."

  
*******

They move and whisper, move again, whisper more. They move toward the stairs, circling around, watching for the creature. It knows why they are drawn there, and so it is there that it will wait. The new humans have proven to be cleverer, tougher than the scientists and their security. Better for them to come here, to be made to attack on the creature's terms, where it can have the higher ground.

The monsters in the lab have given it a crafty intelligence and a terrible strength, but its long captivity and torture have given it something more. The patience to wait, to wait for the men to come to the stairs, where they are drawn like magnets. Years in cages has given the creature the patience to wait as long as it takes, and also the rage to tear the men limb from limb when that patience finally pays off.

********

They are careful, but they do not come across it, are not attacked.

"Maybe it's not here anymore," Bruce offers hopefully. "It got out somehow or...got itself stuck somewhere. Or died. Frankly, I don't care what happened, as long as we're not in here with it."

"No way it's that easy," Tony says darkly, and Clint nods in agreement. "That little bastard is here somewhere, lying in wait. Hoping to get one of us alone, like it did before. Because it's smart."

"How smart can it be? It's an animal. Or something." Clint is still on high alert, eyes darting in every direction, his body as tense as a bowstring.

"No, it's smart," Tony insists, then pauses, thinking. He laughs ruefully. "It's not out here. It's not here because it _is_ lying in wait. It is in the fucking stairwell, ready to ambush us the second we make a break for it. It's probably been there the whole time we've been creeping around down here like a bunch of assholes."

Clint still appears doubtful, but lowers his gun. He looks at Bruce speculatively. "I'm guessing there should be no Hulk in the stairs, huh?"

"Not if you want a stairwell that you will be able to walk up and out of afterwards."

"Well, I'd prefer it." Clint sighs, looks at the door, at Tony's injured leg, at the gun. "What if..." he trails off, glances at the ceiling, at the hallway. "What if I can draw it out and away? Could you attack it somewhere else, like in the lab or the end of the hall? Tony and I can bug the hell out while you fight it, then the Hulk can follow after it is dead?"

"That could work," Bruce agrees slowly.

Tony is aghast. "Tweetie Bird, you are _not_ going to bait that thing out. Tell me you aren't really planning that, because it's going to tear your face off and wear it."

"I'm a fast runner," Clint says with a grin, but Tony can see he's already moving into Hawkeye mode, all ruthless and deadly utility. "I'll make it. Bruce, you position yourself at the end of this hallway. I'll bring it out to you. Tony, you barricade yourself in one of those offices until that thing is dead or until I come to get you."

"Bullshit," Tony spits. "I can help."

"Not with that leg. Get out when it's time, that's your job. Your _only_  job. Nothing else." He says this with the cold efficiency of planning a mission, no room for sentimentality or hurt feelings.

Bruce's face is also serious. "Clint, I'm going to want you completely out of the way before I do anything."

"I'll be up here." Clint reaches up and pushes one of the ceiling panels up and to the side.

"You'll fall through, dummy," Tony points out angrily. "Those panels can't support your weight."

"No, but the joists that run between them can. Don't worry, Tony, I know my way around a ceiling." He winks, looking a little more like himself.

Tony shakes his head. "This is a terrible plan."

"It's a good plan."

Bruce agrees somberly. "It's a good plan. Let's end this."

*******

The creature can hear them talking outside. They will make their move soon.

It waits at the top of the stairs, crouched near the corpse of the scientist. The creature looks at the white lab coat, which isn't so white anymore. Seeing it helps focus its anger, its resolve.

The door pushes open, and one of them enter. It is the hunter, as the creature knew it would be.

Now the time has come to see which of them will be predator and which will be prey.

*******

Clint moves into the stairwell. In here the emergency light blinks on and off lazily, and that throws a wrench in the plan, but is not enough to change it. He can hear a low growl reverberate off the concrete walls, can almost feel it in his bones. He is filled with tension, and it rolls off his body in waves he knows the creature can sense, if not smell.

That is alright; he is meant to be tracked this time.

"Where _are_ you, you sonofabitch?" Clint says, and is pleased that his voice sounds strong, unafraid. There is no movement above him, just that low, sustained growl that seems to come from everywhere. He doesn't want to go up the stairs if he can avoid it; each step up is one he'll have to come down again trying to get away from the damned thing, but it looks like the creature will not be lured out so easily. He grits his teeth and climbs the first flight of stairs, then another.

He didn't bring the gun, it was useless, but now he wishes he had it anyway. Wishes he had something to hold onto. His eyes search everywhere when the light blinks on, and he almost stops breathing each time they go off again.

"Jesus wants me for a sunbeam, to shine for him each day," Clint sings slowly. His nerves are electric as he takes one step up, then two. A third. "In every way to please him..." He hears the scrape of claws from somewhere above, then silence.

"At home..." He takes another step up.

The emergency lights flash on. "...at school..."

The lights go off. "...at play."

"A sunbeam, a sunbeam..." The lights flash on. He hears the sound again, of long nails scratching the floor as it moves, growling.

"Jesus wants me for a sunbeam..." The lights go off, and he barely has time to register the hot breath in his face before the thing is upon him.

The momentum of the creature's leap sends Clint flying backwards down one flight of stairs, landing at the bottom with an impact that knocks every scrap of air from his lungs. He pushes back at the creature at the same time he struggles to pull a breath in, and the lights flash on again to illuminate a large pair of dripping jaws that snap at his face. Claws slice down through his shoulder and chest, leaving long red gouges.

Clint gets his breath back just as the creature's teeth clamp down between his neck and shoulder, and only years of Shield training and practice in the field keep from crying out. Because if he screams Tony will abandon the plan and come to save him, injured leg be damned, and may be killed himself.

Or Bruce will come, and that would be worse.

Clint has some pretty significant upper body strength from his archery, and he is able to push it off himself while simultaneously pulling out the scalpel he had secured earlier, cutting up into the creature's belly, which is softer and, as he had hoped, unarmored. He earns himself a few more long cuts on his arms from the creature's claws, but it draws back, howling and twisting away from the blade in his hand.

Clint rolls to his feet and sprints down the stairs for the door, praying he doesn't trip, resisting the urge to cast a look back. The creature regains its footing immediately and follows, howling with pain and rage, a heartbeat behind him.

********

It takes every bit of control Bruce has ever had not to transform the moment the noises begin in the stairs. It's a very near thing, but he holds on for the last precious seconds it takes for Clint to skid out of the doorway, then leap up to grab the exposed ceiling joist with his fingertips, pulling himself up. Seeing the archer's bloodied, wide eyed face before he disappears to safety is the final, unneeded push the Hulk needs to emerge.

( _I thought it'd be bigger_ ) is Bruce's one surprised thought, and the Hulk agrees as the creature comes hurtling out of the stairwell like a bullet. It charges toward the Hulk on four clawed legs, intent on its attack. It seems impossible to believe that something so small could have wiped out an entire facility and almost bested three Avengers, but it had. The creature takes one last frenzied leap, attempting to bite through the Hulk's skin before he crushes its skull easily and tosses it aside.

It is too simple, really, and Hulk is disappointed.

*******

"Clint!" Tony yells. "Come down, it's dead."

There is still no movement or response from the ceiling above, and Tony is almost panicking, but is afraid of agitating the Hulk any further in this confined space.

"Clint! Come on, Tweetie, I can't climb up in there after you."

Hulk seems to understand and tears out several of the ceiling panels. He reaches up with one questing hand and plucks Clint out easily. Tony hovers anxiously, cataloguing injuries--there are some deep scratches and bites that should be bandaged immediately--but Hulk doesn't seem interested in letting that happen, cradling Clint to his chest possessively.

The man is conscious, but just barely, blinking at Tony. "That was...intense," he says slowly, then manages a shaky chuckle. "I don't think it liked my singing."

"That's because you suck," Tony says sagely, and then laughs, sagging against the wall, his bad leg hardly able to support him any longer.

Hulk looks down at Tony with inscrutable eyes, then scoops the inventor up in his other arm with surprising tenderness. "Home," he rumbles, and then is running so fast it feels to Tony like they are flying, flying up the stairs. The door at the top has been secured shut, but it is nothing for the Hulk to kick it, and all the ones that follow, open.

And they are free.

*******

It attacked the hunter on the stairs, who hurt it and ran, ran toward the strange man, who had been waiting. It was not until the hunter disappeared into the ceiling and the creature was left with only the other man to attack that it realized it had been tricked.

Tricked by humans again.

And for the last time.

The strange man grew, and that vague scent he had smelled of before took over completely, and he changed, becoming something huge and strong, the embodiment of all the cruelty of the monsters, becoming the worst one. Its green flesh was not like a man's; the creature's teeth could do no damage to it, and the monster, with its hideous strength, crushed its body easily, tossed it carelessly to the floor.

The creature had been an animal, once.

It had been taken and twisted and gifted a sick intelligence and had then been driven to hate.

But before...before this place it had only ever wanted to be called good, to lay at its family's feet, to be safe and warm and cared for.

That had been everything then. All it ever wanted.

The men talk with each other, laugh.

The creature knows it is dying and feels a slight sadness that it never was able to escape this tomb, was never able to free itself, to feel sunshine again before the end came.

But there is also relief, because whatever happens after death, at least there will be no more monsters.


End file.
